::: metaphlog :::
Mon, Jan 29, 2007
Star Wars Meets YouTube
Unlike our earlier Matrix link, this fan-created film actually has a bit of humor and style in it. Subsequent episodes aplenty.
Sun, Jan 21, 2007
The Matrix Meets YouTube
"You think that's air that you're breathing?" Thanks, um, to Bob Gates for the link, we think.
Wed, Jan 17, 2007
David Bordwell Speaks, But Is Not Seen
Film students everywhere will want to listen in on Annie Frisbie's podcast interview with omnipresent film text author David Bordwell as he answers her questions regarding cinema, YouTube, and related cineminutiae. Sound quality is not that great due to what seems like Prof Bordwell's phone, but that may be simply a function of UW-Madison's ancient telephony - the whole thing lends itself to the pre-existing undergraduate perception that the professor is, in fact, a disembodied voice narrating the movie of our times...cinematic! Thanks to Annie Frisbie for the link and the interview.
Fri, Jan 12, 2007
Chewbacca: Matchmaker, Mythkeeper, Main Character
It's 2007 and nearly a full thirty years since the original Star Wars came out on May 25, 1977. In light of Episodes 1-3, you owe it to yourself to finally and fully understand the significance of Chewbacca (and to a lesser extent, R2-D2). Keith Martin stands up to the task of reinterpreting post-prequel Star Wars brilliantly. Thanks to Scott Greider for the link.
Wed, Nov 29, 2006
Get Happy, Get Bliss
If you don't have time to watch Modern Times, Citizen Kane, Brazil, The Wall, E.T., the Australian satire Bliss, Office Space and The Matrix, then steal a few moments to watch More, the stop-motion-animated film that captures the message of those films with the density and essentialness of a zen koan. In the age of time compression, look for this as the trend of future filmmaking: two years to make a six-minute masterpiece that is itself a condensation of 70 years of filmmaking.
Mon, Oct 30, 2006
Lloyd Cole, Film Interpreter
Perennial hopeful-yet-melancholic Lloyd Cole has a new album out, Antidepressant, which is worth noting to Metaphilm fans for the song, Woman In A Bar, which is a fine tribute to both Lost In Translation as well as Girl With A Pearl Earring. Opening lyrics:
Idealized vision of a woman through a smoke-filled,
twentieth-century screenplay, advancing,
Toward protagonist with paperback and beard,
manifestly failing, to disappear.
Now that the children are asleep, you want to play,
But you're so lazy...
She walks into the bar,
There you are.
Still life watercolour Woman In A Window...
Other films seem to be referenced, which your publisher has not seen, and then later in the song, Cole admits what his true obsession was all along:
No longer angry,
No longer young,
No longer driven to distraction,
Not even by Scarlett Johansson.
The Meatrix Has You
The sequel to The Meatrix is now up, and it's Revolting. Must-see for Matrix fans and organic farmers (and the foodies who love them) everywhere.
Wed, Sep 20, 2006
This Comes Highly Recommended
This comes highly recommended, from several sources.
Sun, Jul 09, 2006
A Knight's Tale
Ran across recently Gilbert, the magazine of the G. K. Chesterton Society of North America. In their sample issue online is an interpretation of the Heath Ledger movie, A Knight's Tale, which is appropriately Chestertonian—paradoxical and insightful. Reviewer Art Livingston manages to redeem the movie for me (I liked it, but there was definite wincing going on; now I'll have to watch it again—and isn't that the point of the best reviews?).
“Slowly, I caught on to what the filmmakers had in mind. Only until recently have people paid much attention to minute historical accuracy, and our ancestors would have thought it blatant pedantry to do so. As late as the 18th century, actors trod the boards in performances of Joseph Addison's Cato while being bedecked in periwigs. Similarly, the real Chaucer cared so little for such accuracy that the laws of chivalry bind an ancient Trojan like Troilus. And then the truth dawned on me: this story is being told the medieval way, just as surely as clocks strike the hour in Julius Caesar—without regard to historicism. ”
The article is likely to go away after a while, so if anybody needs a copy, let me know.
Mon, May 15, 2006
Da Vinci Code CleAVes You Wondering
From the "we can't help but wonder" department: notice the font similarities between the CLEAVE logo's use of the AV (designed 1998, launched 1999) and the movie graphics for The Da Vinci Code, using the same AV design in which the A and V are inversions of each other. The ancient correlation between the two is seen in the star of David, in which the upward-pointing triangle is the symbol of man, fire (sacrifice), smoke (prayer), and therefore mankind, while the downward pointing triangle is the symbol of woman, water, mercy (rain), and judgment (flood), and therefore the godhead. So presumably Man(kind) and God will get along just as soon as men and women get along... I wonder how long before ViAgra takes notice and changes their logo?
Wed, May 10, 2006
Cyber Cinema, 1981-2001
Reader Doug Van Hollen points out “a piece (actually a series of pieces) on cyberpunk cinema and its various hiding places 1981–2001. This guy really knows his stuff and is willing to look in odd places (Batman as the ultimate cyberpunk? And Predator?!), while providing new insights into all the obvious ones.” Thanks, Doug.
Wed, Mar 22, 2006
Another Calvin & Hobbes and Fight Club Connection
Thanks to Thomas Sowell for sending us the link to this one, which reconfirms our original conviction. In related news, we're extending the deadline and reupping the call for papers for Fight Club and Philosophy, due to the fact that we received far fewer submissions than promised. E-mail to submissions@metaphilm.com if you've got something you've always wanted to work on -- Chuck Palahniuk has agreed to write the intro, so hit us as hard as you can.
Sun, Mar 19, 2006
Sopranos in Drag
Reader Aaron Hoffer sends us a link to an interpretive review of The Sopranos in the Washington Post (12 March 2006), which includes this interesting idea: “The mob story, it might be argued, replaced the Western as the great American epic in the last third of the 20th century. As the counterculture was shredding the myth of the West into a million little pieces with movies such as "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," "The Wild Bunch" and even "Midnight Cowboy," the first two "Godfather" movies were winning Best Picture Oscars. Those films retold the American epic on the urban frontier. "Goodfellas" solidified the idea that "Mafia + Movie = Art."” A story of the American Dream, a sitcom in dramatic drag. A nice read. Thanks, Aaron.
Tue, Feb 28, 2006
Sacred Profanity
No wonder they call it The Holy Land. A spoof ad from Holy Virals, found on Metacafe, makes a pitch for Israeli tourism by remaking the connection that Jesus Jeans made back in the 1970's. At the opening of the clip, notice the Metacafe logo font and "Are you bored?" tagline -- look familiar?
Mon, Feb 27, 2006
Good Night and Good Luck
Reader David Schaap has blogged a great interpretation of George Clooney's feel-good political film (the black and white one, I mean). “This film is not about the wanton abuse of political power for self-aggrandizing purposes and the persecution of liberals and other political enemies during the 50's. Oh, no. It is about the persecution of smokers today.” Great stuff. "Are you now, or have you ever been, a smoker?"
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